1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a system to contain and retrieve oil and gas from a deep water well that has developed uncontrollable discharge. Specifically, the invention describes a non-rigid containment and retrieval system stored surrounding the well on the ocean floor in such a manner that it does not interfere with drilling or production activities and that can be activated at the time of the well failure on demand for immediate protection of the environment from deep water discharged oil and gas.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In May 2010 there was a disastrous deepwater oil well failure in the Gulf of Mexico that caused great damage to the environment because of the sheer volume of discharged oil that could not be contained for several months. Because deep water oil and gas wells are submerged under water, often below 500 feet, the water pressure is so great that human beings cannot reach the depths to fix a broken well. There are thousands and thousands of deepwater oil wells throughout the world. Each deepwater oil well is a disaster waiting to happen, even if the well is no longer in service.
There are numerous devices and systems that have been described in the literature, including prior issued U.S. patents that deal with containment and retrieval of uncontrollably discharged oil and gas from deep water wells. One common problem with these systems is that the recovery systems are not stored at the well site or in position at the well before the oil well failure. Therefore, there is a significant amount of time required to install at the well site any one of these systems in order to start containing and retrieving discharged oil. Unfortunately, based on the discharge rates possible by broken oil wells, millions of gallons of polluting oil can have already been discharged before any of these systems could be realistically put in operating position. An example of a prior U.S. patent showing a system is U.S. Pat. No. 3,664,136, issued May 23, 1972. In this device, the containment devices installed are conical in shape and are used to contain and retrieve oil after the well has ruptured. There is no provision for storing this device permanently surrounding the oil well site on the bottom of the ocean for instant deployment. Another example of a prior U.S. Patent showing a system is U.S. Pat. No. 3,548,605 filed Dec. 22, 1970. In this device the system is a mobile apparatus adapted to be lowered to an underwater location. Although the device could be stored nearby, its design would not allow it to be stored surrounding the well in place and it would need to be moved into place when needed. It included a one piece fluid gathering funnel shaped collector and a canopy (discharge vent tube) in sections. This device may include a cover (dome) to collect gases. However this dome is of one solid piece and is positioned at the surface of the water, not at the bottom at the site of the leaking well. The discharge vent tube in this device is provided shape by rings as opposed to the air chambers in the instant device.
The Applicant's invention described herein will be installed at a well site surrounding the well before the well is damaged. The system can be deployed on demand on a moment's notice at the damaged oil well site on the bottom of the ocean at the time of the rupture remotely from the ocean surface from the oil rig itself. By having an on demand deployment, the oil spill rupture can be contained and retrieved virtually immediately, thus allowing the system to protect the environment against millions and millions of gallons of oil that could have been discharged while trying to bring in or position containment devices known in the prior art.